Paterson: Not since the Great Depression

The state’s current fiscal crisis may be the worst since the Great Depression, Gov. David Paterson just suggested during an interview on Talk-1300 radio.

“We may be as challenged as we have been since the Great Depression,” Paterson just told host Fred Dicker during an interview in which the governor hammered away at the theme he has sounded for more than a month now: State revenues are about to ”fall off the table” due to Wall Street’s woes.

Paterson started his radio appearance with a near-repeat of the speech he gave on TV earlier this month, explaining why he called lawmakers back to town today to try and cut the state budget.

There’s still plenty of work to be done, Paterson said, stressing that he doesn’t yet have agreements to cut the $600 million he’s asking for — or any other amount of money for that matter.

Both leaders — Shelly Silver and Dean Skelos — have ”gotten into the weeds and tried to work on some of these issues,” and both have offered up their own savings suggestions.

This is the governor’s second radio interview this morning as he pushes to build support for his cuts in the face of millions of dollars of ads by teachers and public employee unions urging lawmakers not to cut spending.

He sounded similar themes earlier in the NYC-based John Gambling show on WOR.

After his radio appearance, Paterson signaled some modest wiggle room on his call for a tax cap, saying that some poor districts might ”suffer” from a cap. “If that were the case, I can see the potential for relief from them.”

The governor also said he’s willing to work all week with lawmakers if that’s what’s needed to balance the budget. If that doesn’t happen and if the state’s finances are still out of whack later this year lawmakers would have to come back by law to balance the budget.
Paterson, though, didn’t go so far as to pledge that they’d be back before election day.